Regulating the Identity Earthquake

Somatic Therapy

Pregnant mother sitting in a chair in the sun, practicing somatic grounding.

The transition to and being in motherhood or matrescene is a unique physical experience

You experience a racing heart, a clenched jaw, or a constant feeling of being "on edge." Or you feel numb or disconnected from your body either during pregnancy or since giving birth and you find it hard to feel truly present with your baby.

Mother nose to nose with her baby, smiling and practicing co-regulation.

In the high-pressure and fast-paced culture of Silicon Valley, many parents find themselves stuck in cycles of constant action due to productivity demands and pressure to perform. This leads to their nervous systems actually being stuck in survival mode, especially when they are also parents.

Somatic therapy goes beyond traditional talk therapy by focusing on the body's language. You must first regulate the body before you can address thoughts and mindset. By learning to recognize and understand your nervous system’s signals, we can address the body’s experience of your anxiety, rage, or exhaustion. This approach allows you to move out of reacting and into intentionality.

rage-somatic-release.jpg Mother screaming into a pillow while baby sleeps, illustrating hyper-arousal.

  • Hyper-arousal focus on the sense of hypervigilance, the constant “on edge” feeling of looking for danger everywhere. You may experience racing thoughts, flashes of rage or irritability, or inability to sleep even when you can get rest because you can’t shut your mind off. Being a mother, is an experience of constantly worried, overstimulated, and on alert. Whether its adjusting to the identity shift of motherhood, expanding the family, or a traumatized birth experience, being able to regulate your nervous system is a necessity for being a healthy and connected mother.

Mother holding a newborn while experiencing a somatic "shut down" response, specifically hypoarousal.
Mother and toddler looking at the camera and smiling after a therapy session.

  • Hypo-arousal focus on dissociation, the feeling of being “checked out” and feeling numb or heavy. You may experience slowness in thoughts, disconnection from others, or low mood or motivation. These experience can be scary as a mother because you fear you maybe unable to bond and attachment‍ ‍with your bab, that you aren’t able to function at work or at home, or that you are missing out on important milestones with your baby. Finding ways to activate and energize your nervous system will help you get out of feeling stuck in dissociation.

  • When you have a regulated nervous system, motherhood feels more enjoyable and smoother. You feel like a more responsive, engaging, and calmer mother. It is the optimal place to be when navigating the shifts of the identity earthquake of motherhood allowing you to weather the normal storms of raising young children. Getting to that window of tolerance requires regulation of your nervous system integrating these activities into your daily routine.

Move Out of Survival Mode
Move Out of Survival Mode

Motherhood is experienced in the body and in the mind. In our sessions, we work on how to calm and center the body in order to manage the thoughts and reactions. This approach supports you by:

Pregnant mother holding her toddler in the air and giving a kiss.

  • Expanding Your Window of Tolerance: We find the moments your body gets triggered with feeling overwhelmed or shutting down, giving you the tools to keep your nervous system regulated to maintain connection with your child.

  • Regulating the Identity Earthquake: Using body-based grounding techniques to center yourself when you're managing the different identities of the professional, personal, and maternal shifts, which feel like they are pulling you in opposite directions.

  • Strengthening the Dyadic Connection: By learning to regulate your own nervous system, you create a "calm anchor" for your child, allowing for deeper co-regulation and a more secure bond.

  • Processing Birth Trauma Through the Body: Addressing how the body holds the memory of difficult deliveries or stressful medical events, allowing for a physiological release that talk therapy alone often can't reach.

  • Integrating Insight with Action: While we use Psychodynamic Therapy to understand the "why" of your patterns, somatic tools provide the "how" for managing your heart rate and breath in the heat of a Silicon Valley workday.

Frequently Asked Questions

  • Somatic therapy is a body-centered approach to healing. Rather than just talking about stress, we work to release the physical tension and "fight-or-flight" energy stored in the body. This helps you regulate your emotions from the bottom up, leading to a deeper sense of physical and emotional safety.

  • The "fight-or-flight" response of your brain does not respond to language because that is not where that ability is housed in the brain. You can’t talk the nervous system to calm down, but you need repetitive rhythmic movement to let that part of the brain know that it is safe.

  • Not in the way you’d expect at a gym. My goal is to always center the client, which means I develop an individualized plan to targets their unique nervous system in order to regulate it. While some clients prefer mindfulness exercises, another may prefer doing for walks. Both are acceptable forms of regulating your nervous syste.

  • While somatic therapy uses mindfulness and meditation can be a tool, it is a more active and relational process. Somatic therapy involves an interactive dialogue to understand your reactive responses and integrating body based activities that can signal your nervous system that you are safe. We are actively working to “re-wire” how your nervous system handles triggers rather than continuing to be reactive.

  • Many parents in high-pressure Silicon Valley roles feel disconnected from their bodies. It’s actually a common survival strategy. We go at your pace. If reconnecting with your body feels overwhelming, then we will start by simply noticing external grounding points. The goal is to safely bridge the gap between your analytical mind and your physical self.

  • Mom Rage is often a symptom that your nervous system has been pushed past its Window of Tolerance. By the time you feel the rage, your body has already missed several smaller signals of stress. Somatic therapy teaches you to catch those subtle physical cues much earlier, so you can intervene before the explosion happens.

  • Somatic therapy is highly effective through telehealth. Because the focus is on your connection to your body and nervous system, I can guide you through the process on screen. For parents in the South Bay balancing tight schedules, virtual sessions can still provide the same deep nervous system support without the added stress of a commute.